Me Before You (Should've Posted This Ages Ago)

July 22, 2017

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Author: Jojo Moyes

Genre: Contemporary, Adult, Romance

Blurb: Lou Clark knows lots of things. She knows how many footsteps there are between the bus stop and home. She knows she likes working in The Buttered Bun tea shop and she knows she might not love her boyfriend Patrick.

What Lou doesn't know is she's about to lose her job or that knowing what's coming is what keeps her sane.

Will Traynor knows his motorcycle accident took away his desire to live. He knows everything feels very small and rather joyless now, and he knows exactly how he's going to put a stop to that.

What Will doesn't know is that Lou is about to burst into his world in a riot of colour. And neither of them knows they're going to change the other for all time.


I never expected myself to like the book this much. Not because of people's negative reviews. (I distanced myself from as many reviews as possible so I had very limited knowledge about the book before going into it).

Since this was a book within the adult genre, I felt that it was somewhat more realistic. Lou Clark is a 27 year old who still lives with her parents and would sometimes argue with her younger sister in order to receive the attention of her parents. Also, she was almost 'poor' and she lived in a fairly disadvantaged neighbourhood.

I was lucky that the Grishams were the hot news of the evening, or I might have been the topic conversation. In our street, if you climbed into an expensive car it meant you had either pulled a footballer or were being arrested by the plain-clothes police.

Lou Clark also had an interesting personality and a quirky fashion sense. Sometimes she was awkward, sometimes she was passionate, sometimes she was cringy.

Will Traynor was obviously very different in comparison to Lou. He was pretty blunt and sarcastic.


"I just don't really like foreign films."           "Everything after Local Bloody Hero has been a foreign film. D'you think Hollywood is a suburb of Birmingham?"                                                        "Funny."

However, I was surprised that he wasn't straightforward all the time.

I liked how this book had its funny and lighthearted moments such as the dialogue that took place between Will and Lou Clark. I also liked how the POVs outside of Lou's were placed there for a decent reason (at least for me).

On the other side, this book deals with complicated issues like abuse and the controversial topic of whether Dignitas is right or wrong.




Personally, I felt that Lou should not have tried to almost force Will to do things like attend a horse racing event in order to make him happy enough to forget about Dignitas. Another problem I had was that Will still went to Dignitas :( I could understand why he did it, though. On the other hand, there have been complaints from people with disabilities that argued that Will Traynor acts as if it's impossible to live life happily while on a wheelchair. While I do agree that that aspect of the novel is very problematic, I don't believe that the author wrote this book with bad intentions. I say this without dismissing the opinions of those who have been offended by this book.





My second complaint is concerning this quote in Nathan's POV: 


His blood pressure was down. His colour was returning to normal in front of me. I let out a breath I didn't realise I was holding. 

^ Oh, for flip's sake. This novel was published in 2012  so less people probably complained about it back then. Whatever.

Also, though this book was almost long and didn't melt my brain, I felt that it wasn't so special. Not that it was boring and super ordinary but it was not as magical as others made it seem to be. However, it was fun but sad and full of familiar English banter so I was satisfied.

Recommendation: For those who are curious.

Content: Swearing, kissing, also mentioned that the protagonist had sex but gave no real description of what happened.


4 stars our of five







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10 comments

  1. I also agree that there are some very problematic aspects to this book, but the fact is that some people want euthanasia, whether they've been disabled their whole life or only recently or for whatever reason. I don't know if I think it's right, but it really made me think about the issue in a way that I hadn't before. I loved Lou and I felt she was a really great character. Overall, I actually really liked this book but I still thought the ending was really sad.

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    1. yeah, lou was so vibrant but the book was so sad :(

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  2. I've read this! I thought it was okay, and I'm not really sure about the representation. But it was quite a powerful novel. Nice review!

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  3. I do agree that while this book deals with complex topics, I actually didn't mind the book-- probably because half of the time I was more focused on paying attention on seeing Will and Lou's friendship grow to the point where the main part of the novel of why Lou is hired in the first place just dissipates, and that's why, alongside the characters having distinct imperfect personalities, I ended up rating it four stars.

    xoxo Abigail Lennah | ups & downs

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    1. Their friendship was definitely intriguing.

      I guess that's a reasonable reason to rate it four stars. Usually either the man or woman are perfect while the other is heavily flawed.

      Thanks for commenting!

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  4. I've been thinking about reading this for a while because I loved the movie quite a bit. Which is weird, because I'm not exactly a romance-y person. *shrugs* I do agree that there are problematic aspects of it (from what I've seen of the movie) but I loved Lou so there's that.

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    1. Same, I'm not a romance-y person either but I guess there wasn't much romance xD

      Yeah, Lou kind of saved the book.

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  5. Haven't read the book, though I did see the movie! I liked Lou, too, she was such a quirky, lovely character! And the banter between her and Will, though. That was great. <3

    The spoiler part saddened me, too. But I'd agree: the author kind of shows it as the character's choice (in a way you can actually understand) and then leaves it at that. No one else really supports it, it's just what Will chose.


    Alexa
    thessalexa.blogspot.com
    verbosityreviews.com

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  6. I liked her personality as well!

    True. The spoiler part :(

    Thanks for commenting!

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Keep it all clean, man. Well, if you really wanna curse, use minor swear words. And I mean the minorest of minor ones.

"Or what?" you ask in indignation.

"Or else."